HOUSTON—Nearly a dozen companies took center stage during Summer NAPE to each give eight-minute pitches, hoping to lure partners for exploration, development and production opportunities in the U.S.

Among them was Josh Cornell, vice president of land for Panther Energy Co. III, who presented a Louisiana Austin Chalk opportunity—the Bloodhound prospect—in Vernon and Beauregard parishes.

“We have 50,000 net acres, mostly 100% ownership tracts. It’s a large contiguous, scalable footprint,” Cornell told a crowd gathered Aug. 15 to hear the prospect preview pitches. “We project over 26 operated DSUs [drill spacing units].”

He added the deep overpressured Austin Chalk Formation is built for long laterals with the company’s asset having a TVD range between 14,000 ft and 16,000 ft.

The Austin Chalk, which spans over 600 miles from the Mexico border into Mississippi, has sparked renewed interest from oil and gas players such as ConocoPhillips and Marathon Oil Corp., which added the play to their exploration portfolios.

Others are already seeing success. EOG Resources, which completed five wells in the South Texas Austin Chalk in second-quarter 2018, captured the spotlight in 2017 when the Eagle Ranch 14-1H well in Avoyelles Parish tested at a rate of 1,120 barrels of oil per day and 1,157 million cubic feet of gas per day.

Cornell spoke about the potential of the Bloodhound prospect, which the company said is an extension of Masters Creek Field.

“Masters Creek has outperformed Brookeland North and Brookeland South from an oil prospective,” Cornell said. The company pointed out in information handed out at its booth average oil production of 97,947 barrels and 168,386 barrels from the Brookeland North and Brookeland South fields, respectively, compared to 348,231 from Masters Creek.

But there are some challenges.

“Our unknown is what water contribution we’re going to get from the fractures,” said Paul Richardson, vice president of geology for Panther Energy. “Our knowns though are a trend with wells that produce fairly well: 8:1 water ratio. But it’s real easy to get rid of the water here.”

Richardson later added that “drilling might be tough with the fractures,” but 320-plus laterals have been drilled in Masters Creek. “So we know it can be done.” Plus, being in an overpressured oil window works to an advantage, he said.

If Panther’s offering—a negotiable three-year primary term with two-year option to extend leases and no drilling commitments—wasn’t what buyers were looking for, there were plenty of other opportunities for investors.